Eye of Saturn: Between Heaven and Saturn Book Two (eBook)

Idalita Raso (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2024 | 1. Auflage
328 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-7316-7 (ISBN)

Infos

BLOOD IS THE SEAT OF THE SOUL... Between Heaven and Saturn 'It wasn't supposed to be this way. I had come to Wallachia to use my vampiric powers in aiding Vlad Dracula III win his war against the Turkish Ottoman Empire, not kill him, transform into his likeness, and rule Wallachia-spawning the vampire legend!' Sultan Mehmed II will stop at nothing to overthrow Prince Dracula and put Radu the Handsome, Dracula's younger brother, on the throne. It's up to Felipe to stop the Sultan. Aided by the Brethren of the Occultus Facultas, mystical monks armed with the Philosopher's Stone, it's a fight for Wallachia's freedom. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking for Felipe to break his vampires curse and rescue his beloved Zaybeth from the Netherworld.

Idalita Wright Raso grew up in Ohio. She is an established news reporter/photojournalist and has worked for the Lake County Gazette in Jefferson, Ohio. Between Heaven and Saturn is book two in the Eye of Saturn series. Idalita has a deep interest in astronomy, mythology, science fiction, the occult, and horror. Her love for writing came after reading Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Fall of the House of Usher.' Her love for vampires came the moment she read Bram Stoker's 'Dracula.' The Eye of Saturn is a vampire horror series. Currently Idalita is working on book three, which she hopes to release spring 2026.

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BLOOD IS THE SEAT OF THE SOUL"e;I am Felipe de Hayos. I am a lamsivetalak the undead in Solsatihel, the language of Saturn and the gods a vampire for lack of a better word. I was cursed by my wife, Saturn's Immortal High Priestess, to walk this Earth as the undead for five hundred and fifty years, until the Eye of Saturn opens and the battle to the death begins with my beloved, Zaybeth."e; Between Heaven and Saturn"e;It wasn't supposed to be this way. I had come to Wallachia to use my vampiric powers in aiding Vlad Dracula III win his war against the Turkish Ottoman Empire, not kill him, transform into his likeness, and rule Wallachia spawning the vampire legend!"e;Sultan Mehmed II will stop at nothing to overthrow Prince Dracula and put Radu the Handsome, Dracula's younger brother, on the throne. It's up to Felipe to stop the Sultan. Aided by the Brethren of the Occultus Facultas, mystical monks armed with the Philosopher's Stone, it's a fight for Wallachia's freedom. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking for Felipe to break his vampires curse and rescue his beloved Zaybeth from the Netherworld. Felipe's epic journey takes him from the fierce battles between the Turkish Ottoman Empire and Wallachia to the New World where he discovers there's an even greater evil than being a vampire slavery. Felipe is where the cursed live Between Heaven and Saturn.

Textauszug

CHAPTER 1

This can’t be good, Lieutenant General Stefan cel Mare anxiously thought as he stood outside Dracula’s secret parlor. The last time Dracula summoned him to the parlor there was a mysterious intruder. When he arrived, all that remained of the intruder was a bloodless corpse, ripped to shreds, lying in a heap on the floor. Stefan let out a deep breath.

Although he was taller and more powerful than Dracula—taking on five men in battle and emerging victorious—he feared Dracula more than any other warrior. This time he had good reason to fear. If his hunch was correct and the man behind that door was actually an imposter, he feared him more than Dracula. For any man who had the cunning to kill Dracula and the power to rip his body to shreds was a force to be reckoned with, indeed.

Stefan took a quick inventory of his weapons before giving a loud knock and stepping into the parlor. “You sent for me, Lord Dracula?”

Felipe was lounging on the sofa transformed in Vlad Dracula’s likeness, enjoying a glass of wine. He narrowed his gaze as Stefan entered the parlor. His eyes locked firmly on the man. Using his vampiric mind probing powers, Felipe scanned Stefan’s thoughts in hopes of placing him under hypnotic control. A black void. Impossible! Another failed attempt to read Stefan’s mind. How is he blocking my powers? What is he? Is he a witch? Felipe stared at the Lieutenant General in amazement, his steely eyes still streaming. Well, whatever he is, his will is strong.

“Yes, Stefan, I shall take to the streets tomorrow afternoon and get better acquainted with the people of Wallachia.”

“I’ll inform your escorts, Lord Dracula.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

Stefan cut Dracula with a curious look.

Felipe rose from the sofa and walked over to Stefan. “I trust you, cousin. You shall be my personal escort and bodyguard,” he said, giving the Lieutenant General a firm pat on the back.

While Felipe strode through the streets and villages of Wallachia, in the guise of Dracula, he noticed there were numerous beggars and cripples lining the streets, much more than he would have liked to have seen. After taking in all he could stomach, Felipe stopped walking and stood in the center of town square to make an announcement. A large crowd gathered around Felipe. Giving into Dracula’s sick sense of compassion, Felipe spoke.

“I decree that no one shall go hungry in this land. I’m issuing an invitation to all the poor and sick in Wallachia to come to Târgoviște tomorrow night at the Great Hall. There will be a feast, a celebration of Wallachia’s less fortunate,” Felipe said.

The crowd cheered and chanted, “Dracula!”

Târgoviște The Great Hall

Guards ushered the poor, sick, and crippled into the grand banquet hall. The feast lasted well into the late night when Felipe finally made an appearance, guised as Dracula. “My good people of Wallachia, how would you like every day to be a feast? How would you like to live a life without any cares in the world, lacking and wanting for nothing?”

The people applauded and shouted positively.

“I firmly believe that after tonight, no one here shall ever go hungry or have any cares. The best, my friends, is still to come.”

The people clapped and praised the voivode.

Felipe turned to Stefan and whispered into his ear. “Board up the hall and set it on fire. After all, it’s the only merciful thing I can do for them.”

Stefan stood motionless.

“Is there a problem, Lieutenant General?” Felipe asked in an eerily chilling tone. Felipe’s eyes darkened as the Eye of Saturn flashed in his pupils. “I gave you an order.”

“Yes, Lord Dracula.” Stefan bowed. He signaled to Vlad’s
henchmen.

Felipe’s ungodly thirst for blood and hunger for human flesh, overwhelmed him. He selected a plump woman at the table for his late-night meal. Moving faster than the speed of light, Felipe seized the woman, placing her in a hypnotic trance. In a whiff of magick, Felipe and the woman disappeared to Dracula’s secret parlor. He placed the spellbound woman on the sofa and teleported back to Târgoviște.

The peasants were too busy eating and drinking to notice Dracula and the guards had exited the hall. By the time anyone noticed, it was too late. Thick black smoke had filled the room. A white-hot jet of flame shot from one side of the hall to the other. The peasants looked at one another in a horrible glimmer of momentary confusion. Flames leaped up the walls, hissing. The raging great fire sent curls of black smoke, swirling all about them. Frantically, people started running for the door, pushing the crippled and the elderly to the floor, trampling them beneath one another. The door was nailed shut.

“Lord Dracula, please let us out!” the people cried.

Panicked stricken, people started climbing on the backs of the fallen to reach the high windows, only to find the windows had been boarded.

A rolling yellow tongue of flames consumed the roof of the great hall. The blast from the rolling flames sent one man airborne, landing him clear across the other side of the room. His body ignited just as a flame exploded down from the ceiling. The great hall was an inferno.

People scattered in all directions as they ducked flames and falling wood and mortar, that was crashing in and all around them. Many succumbing to the thick smoke, gasping in desperation for breathable air before surrendering to their death. There was a final eruption and the great hall collapsed, killing everyone inside.

Felipe and Dracula’s guards sat on horseback on a nearby hill, watching the great hall burn to the ground. Felipe sniffed the smoky air. A sick grin streaked across his face. “Ah, the aroma of roasted peasants, there’s nothing like it.” He turned to Stefan. “I’m famished. Let’s get back to the castle.”

Felipe retreated to Dracula’s secret parlor where he feasted on the spellbound woman. Her warm blood soothed his parched throat. But Felipe was also hungry. He devoured the woman’s entire body, leaving only her kidneys and gallbladder among the bones. With a flick of his finger, the woman’s remains flew into the fireplace.

The flames popped and hissed as it received the human kindling.

Felipe paused as he posed in front of the mirror that hung over the fireplace. He glared back at Vlad’s likeness with repulsion. With a wave of his hand, he dismissed the image and transformed into his true human form. “Much better,” Felipe said, delighted to be staring back at his own face in the mirror, instead of Dracula’s image.

Felipe stepped forward to get a closer look at his face, as he gazed into the mirror his features started liquefying and rip right down the middle. Vlad Dracula’s face slithered out from his own. Dracula’s face started morphing grotesquely back and forth into Felipe likeness.

Stupefied, Felipe closed his eyes and reopened them. Only his reflection stared back at him in the mirror. That was strange. I must be hallucinating, he thought. He gave a nervous half-laugh when it happened again. However, this time Dracula’s face appeared in the mirror next to Felipe’s own face—floating right out of the mirror.

Dracula’s ghostly face glared at Felipe with a sick and twisted smile. “Good boy, Felipe. You have proven yourself most useful in carrying out my plans,” Dracula praised. “Now, no one in Wallachia shall be poor,” Dracula wickedly laughed.

Felipe’s temples started to throb. Dracula’s image evaporated, giving way to images of the peasants burning in the great hall. Dracula’s sinister laughter reverberated throughout the parlor. Felipe shut his eyes tight and reopened them gradually, Dracula’s reflection and the images were gone.

Felipe’s thoughts were muddled. The illusion had weakened him. He reclined on the sofa with a glass of wine, trying to purge Vlad’s thoughts and desires from his own mind. There was a soft knock and the door opened. Felipe glanced up at a mirror which was perfectly angled to see anyone entering the parlor. Relieved it was only Dracula’s wife, and under his control, he didn’t have to assume Vlad’s likeness, for he lacked the strength to transform.

He summoned enough strength to sit upright. “Elisabeta, I thought I told you to never come in here. How did you get past my guards?”

“I’m sorry Vlad, but you forgot to tuck little Mihnea in bed,” she said softly. “You promised family would come first and politics would come second. Your son misses you. A boy needs his father.”

“Indeed. Forgive me, my love for my thoughtlessness.” Felipe drained the last drop of wine from the glass and sat it down on a nearby table. He rose from the sofa. His strength had returned. He took one last glance at himself in the mirror before transforming into Vlad’s likeness and stepped out into the hallway. Felipe whispered in a guard’s ear. He gave the guard a...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 30.9.2024
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Lyrik / Dramatik ► Dramatik / Theater
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-7316-7 / 9798350973167